This blog is about my journey from doggedly pursuing the end of a day, to living a wide awake life while writing a book. And really what's the difference? Life is an impression that one experiences and a book is an expression of experiences.
This is a compilation of lessons from gurus and the realization that I'm not just a bunch of atoms stumbling a path, but an orchestrated bit of consciousness dancing a simply beautiful dance...naked with everyone watching.

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Monday, July 13, 2015

Magical Reality

At a meeting of the In Print Writers Organization, the participants are asked to name their reading preferences. Barnes and Noble street signs fill the room. "Mystery!" "Fiction!" "Memoir!" "Literary Fiction!"I try to fit the books I like into a genre box. Typically I reach for novels that reflect my life. As an adolescent I leaned toward stories about kids going through difficult childhoods or not fitting in. When I hit my twenties I fantasized with romance novels while my own love life swayed up and down. As a young mother I gravitated toward articles about parenting and how the world was going to hell in a hand basket. Now fifty-four, I settle in to read about overcoming obstacles with awareness, humor and magic. In a split-second I shout my preferred book genre to the room of writers. "Magical Reality!"The room answers back. "What's that?" "Don't you mean fantasy? Or Magical Realism?"It isn't a new thing, describing what I mean in reference to a word seen from most folding chairs as something that describes impossibility. To further confuse the issue I have linked it with what is understood as the exact opposite, reality. I give it a shot, sharing a teaser for the concept. "It's like when weird things happen after you meet a shaman or when feathers drop in front of you on a bike path or getting your aura read and it leads to crazy stuff happening."This would also be a description for my life and the memoir I've recently brought back from the dead, 20 Gurus and a Dog. The group conversation ends without making myself clear. Magical reality is everyday events sprinkled with pixie dust. This isn't a religious concept, a schizophrenic imagining or a need to make 20 Gurus sit on its own bookshelf. I have come to view this life experience in technicolor, not black and white. Which means that I expect the unexpected. These can be many things, most of them usually tossed in that bag called coincidences. Examples such as when an adult you runs into a childhood friend on a bus in a far off city or there are feelings of danger the entire day before your offspring calls at 4 am to say they need help or how the smell of tortillas arrives when thinking about your deceased grandmother. Another, what I would consider Magical Reality situation happened recently. The photo at the top of this blog shows three feathers. Two of them are from a Great Horned Owl. The other is a gift from a Red Tail Hawk. They were deposited on my path the last few weeks while I have been engaged with a therapist utilizing EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Recovery). I discussed this in more detail in the previous post, Everybody Wins.Because of these non-random, yet random feathered occurrences I researched the spiritual significance of each raptor online (Magical Reality believers often look for the meaning behind "signs").The Great Horned Owl:

Extractor of Secrets

The Quest Within

Able to Hear What is not Spoken

Harbinger of New Cycles

The Red Tail Hawk has these aspects:

Awareness of the Big Picture

Truth

Illumination

Observation

Apparently (also according to woo-doo.com), the two predators are sisters in their spiritual aspects. They similarly seem to be compatriots on this current adventure to retrieve memories from my past.

I am on a spiritual quest within to observe my illuminated history, extracting secrets to hear what has not been spoken; seeing the truth for what it is while keeping awareness of the big picture, with the knowledge that it will give rise to a brand new cycle.I don't expect Barnes and Noble to recognize my genre choice with a Magical Reality street sign. But then again, I have come to realize that anything is possible on this curious journey that is forever unfolding.